Foreshadowings
by Mr Sinister
Summary: Betsy Braddock contemplates her life after being exposed to the Crimson Dawn


**__**

Foreshadowings

I don't recognise the face in mirror. I haven't for years now. I raise a hand to the cheek that is not my own and run delicate fingers that do not belong to me down the skin that is not the colour I was when I was born. The vivid red slash that bisects my face is there as usual, glowing slightly in the half-light of the morning as it lies over the violet of my left eye. 

As if I expected it not to be.

Behind me Warren snorts and rolls over in bed, his great wings unfurling like sails and covering the bed, spreading feathers all over the crumpled duvet. A couple of them flutter to the floor and I watch them suddenly tossed back up again by the air currents in this, our little love nest. I turn and watch him sleeping, without a care in the world. And why not? He got his original wings back not three weeks ago. He's free of his curse.

Whereas I just got lumbered with another one.

Oh, Warren, I don't begrudge you what's happened – anything but. I just wish that the universe could find some other poor idiot to play its little tricks on. I run my hands through my tousled purple hair and walk back towards Warren; my angel.

My saviour.

I look down at him and I tweak his mind, just a little bit. He hasn't noticed me just yet. Perhaps if I – ah. There we are. Now he knows where I am. I watch him open one of his beautiful blue eyes and look up at me, as if I'm the meanest ogre in the world.

"Did you have to, Betts?" he says, as if I have wronged him in some grievous fashion. 

"Shush," I say. "It's ten thirty, Mr Worthington. I think even lazy little buggers like you have to get up at some point, don't you think?"

"You British," he says, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. "You're always in a hurry to get somewhere, even if you have nowhere to go. Is that some kind of character flaw you people breed into your kids?"

I smile, and, through Warren's eyes, I see my teeth showing between my purple-painted lips, and my eyes twinkling in the dim light of the room. I like to watch myself through Warren's eyes. It helps to convince me that I'm not…

… That I'm not disfigured. And with that thought, my world collapses. Again.

Creed did this to me, I know it. He took away my confidence in myself. Mind you, when you wake up every morning and see six-inch scars in your stomach, and feel twinges in your back where there were none before, it's hard to forget. Warren sees me drifting away and he says, "What's the matter, sweetheart?" with a perceptiveness that could put a telepath to shame.

"What? Nothing," I say. "Everything." He takes my hands in his blue palms and looks me deep in the eyes. I adore you, Warren Worthington, do you know that?

"Come on, sweetie, you can tell me anything, you know that." Warren's eyes follow every movement of my own violet ones, and I find it impossible to break his gaze, like a deer caught in the headlights. Warren can be very persuasive when he wants to be.

"Am I beautiful?" I say suddenly. I can see that that takes him aback for a moment, his mind reeling in surprise. Sometimes I hate being a telepath; everything is laid bare for you, like a colouring book with all the numbers filled in before you buy it. 

"What do you want me to say?" he asks in a soft voice, full of concern and love and worry.

"I want you to tell me the truth!" I cry, my voice rising to an uncharacteristic shriek. I wonder, briefly, why I am doing this. This isn't _me_, this isn't what I _want –_ this isn't anything _near_ that. "I want you to tell me if _this _–" and I gesture frustratedly at the red mark on my face, which is burning intensely as I feel my anger building "– makes you love me any less. I want you to tell me if you look at me differently now." He smiles – smiles! – and then shakes his head.

"You're as beautiful now as the day I first saw you, Betsy," he replies, his voice filled with the warmth and joy that we've shared since we first made love. "More, actually."

"You're lying," I say, even though my telepathy tells me the exact opposite. I can feel his heart and soul crying out for me, like a drowning man gasping for air.

"No," he persists. "No, Betsy, I'm not. I… _need_ you, like I've never needed anyone before in my life. When you were… when I thought I was going to lose you, I felt something in my heart die. You brought it back. You made me whole again."

"And what if you're mistaken?" I say, looking away from him finally. "What if, instead of the woman you knew, you were given a monster in human clothing? What does that make you then? I can feel my humanity slipping away from me, day by day, Warren. I can feel a darkness in my soul that wasn't there before. I haven't had a dream that didn't end as a nightmare in months. And it's all the fault of that _bastard_ Victor Creed –" I break off for a moment, feeling the long-pent-up emotions bubbling their way to the surface. I'm crying – me, the "imperious ice-bitch"! I'm actually crying. I haven't cried for years, but it feels good to let it all come out at once; I can feel the weight coming off my shoulders more and more with each tear that drips off my nose and spatters on the duvet cover. Seeing my distress, Warren hugs me. I try to shake him off, but his wings enfold me as well, the soft, downy feathers forming a gilded cage around me. For the first time, I feel trapped by his love. Again, I try to push him away – more for his sake than for my own – but he won't let me go. He holds on, like Beowulf to the Grendel. I only wish that I could grow fangs and scales to make him let go, but I cannot, and so I give up struggling and simply let him hold me.

"Shhh," he says, his whispers cutting through my sobs like a Stanley knife, but not half as sharp. "Shhh. That's it, Betsy, just let it all out. That's my girl." He kisses my forehead gently, and strokes a stray lock of hair out of my eyes. "That's my girl." Some part of me curses my weakness, my eager willingness to cast off my warrior image for one of snivelling sentimentality, but that part is very small right at this moment, and so I cling to Warren like a frightened child. I lay my head against his shoulder and feel the last of my sobs dying away. 

I take a deep breath and stand away from him, my anger expended and my hatred for Victor Creed expunged – at least for the moment. Warren smiles hopefully at me and runs the fingers of his right hand down my cheek, tracing the rapidly drying salt trails with the tips of his blue digits. 

"If it makes you feel any better, we could go down to Harry's, drown our sorrows, and maybe do a little one-upmanship on who's got the bigger problems," he suggests. "I bet I could out-do you." The sheer absurdity of the idea brings a long overdue smile to my face, and I splutter with laughter because of it. Warren hasn't lost the ability to be a charmer, even after all that's happened to him.

"Thank you, Warren," I say gratefully. "I think that's a splendid idea." 

It takes Warren a lot less time to get ready than I thought it would – he has a talent for squeezing his wings into the harnesses that he uses with little or no help from anybody else – and he dresses in a plain red shirt with blue jeans and some boots that I thought would look less out of place on Logan. "What can I say?" he replies when I ask him about it. "I guess I've just gone native." 

As we get into Warren's Porsche, I think that today might make me feel better after all.

And that's when I hear the wind whisper _"Kuragari…"_


End file.
